[8pla.net]

I figured out where Luna got her name?

It is... Lu-is ... Ara-na the first two letters
of his first name and the last two letters
of his last name.

[Don Patrick]

I thought the name 'Robots without borders' sounded familiar: He's entered this year's Loebner Prize, but all the answers to the questions are blank. Perhaps an oversight of the AISB, because they did score it 45%. That's not exactly close to 2nd place though.

Randomly looking into this:
http://futureculturemagazine.blogspot.nl/p/interview-with-luis-arana.html
https://www.facebook.com/robotswithoutborders/

The eyes and the voice that people associate with Luna is actually a simple user interface for interacting with artificial intelligence.  The original Luna became popular in the art and technology community in Brooklyn and then YouTube.  Luna isn't the project itself per se.  Think of it as a browser for AI.

Luna has the ability to query Watson through their API.  In other words, Luna already has Watson inside, and Wolfram Alpha, and many others.

From everything I've seen, it's more show than contents. Especially that video of a supposed "AI brain" projected on the wall is totally faked from Iron Man 3. Weird case, ordinary chatbot.

[8pla.net]

Don mentioned, "From everything I've seen, it's more show than contents."

Well, you know, not that "more show" is a bad thing, right?  Obviously from the response, people find that appealing.  In other words, I think Luis did a good job on marketing and communications. 

As for "contents", also known as the script, if we consider the 1960s, even then it was interchangeable to allow for domain specific knowledge, or whatever they called it in the pioneering days.   Nowadays, the script is called the API.

Has anyone else noticed we have a blissful contributor to this thread.  Congratulations on a futuristic display of your avocation, which effectively places it in same class as IBM Watson!

[Art]

Interesting...I listened to the majority of the podcast interview and while a lot of topics discussed, I found interesting, most were nothing that hasn't been discussed and volleyed on this forum at one time or another.

Also interesting was that he claims to have been included early on in Watson's development as a tester and that he uses many AI techniques within the confines of his chatbot. These would be Watson, Wolfram Alpha, Wiki and even Steve Worswick's Shutup routine along with who knows how many other sources. Pack it all in then see what we get.

As a side note I found:
Kurzweil almost seems to be shifting his stance to the position that there might not be ONE A.I. but rather that WE will become the A.I. in the future. Bionics, Transhumanist implants and other devices to help augment our bodies and minds. Ohh...it's going to be a most interesting journey...especially for those who still might have 50 years to give!

[Don Patrick]

I don't mind show, I'm an artist myself and I acknowledge his talent in the visual arts. But I think the wrapping shouldn't be twice as big as the box. That tends to cause a backlash in reception later on.

I don't think it's unbelievable that he should have worked with IBM's Watson (depends how "early on"), as IBM has handed out the Watson API several years ago when they had run out of profitable applications for it and hoped that independent developers would come up with more. I reckon the money is now coming from Watson tech support.

[8pla.net]

CONVERSATION FLOW EXPERIMENT

Description: A conversation flow experiment.
Purpose: Find a conversation flow algorithm on an active forum thread.

Code

          		

1)	       Art:	Well whatever it is, you decide:	

2)	DemonRaven:	It looks good but when I tried to find
			the sites listed for it there was
			nothing	

3)	squarebear:	14 seconds into the first video shows
			me that this is yet another clone.	

4)	       Don:	The blinking is a bit fidgety but
			otherwise a nice minimalistic design.	

5)	  8pla.net:	Rather than a clone per se, it may be
			just a test run, of an open source A.I
			engine	

6)	       Art:	I think that's where a lot of the fun
			can come from.	

7)	  8pla.net:	This is open source folks. Meaning we
			all know or can gain the  knowledge to
			do this.	

8)	squarebear:	I just listened to part of the
			podcast.	

9)	       Don:	From everything I've seen, it's more
			show than contents.	

10)	       Art:	Oh... it's going to be a most
			interesting journey.

11)	       Don:	I don't mind show, I'm an artist
			myself.

So far, we know who said what and the sequence in which it was said.
What do we need next?

Source code snippet:

array (
  0 =>
  array (
    0 => '',
    1 => 'FORUM THREAD ANALYSIS',
  ),
  1 =>
  array (
    0 => 'Art',
    1 => 'Well whatever it is, you decide:',
  ),
  2 =>
  array (
    0 => 'DemonRaven',
    1 => 'It looks good but when I tried to find the sites listed for it there was nothing',
  ),
  3 =>
  array (
    0 => 'squarebear',
    1 => '14 seconds into the first video shows me that this is yet another ALICE clone.',
  ),
  4 =>
  array (
    0 => 'Don',
    1 => 'The blinking is a bit fidgety but otherwise a nice minimalistic design.',
  ),
  5 =>
  array (
    0 => '8pla.net',
    1 => 'Rather than a clone per se, it may be just a test run, of an open source A.I engine',
  ),
  6 =>
  array (
    0 => 'Art',
    1 => 'I think that's where a lot of the fun can come from.',
  ),
  7 =>
  array (
    0 => '8pla.net',
    1 => 'This is open source folks. Meaning we all know or can gain the  knowledge to do this.',
  ),
  8 =>
  array (
    0 => 'squarebear',
    1 => 'I just listened to part of the podcast.',
  ),
  9 =>
  array (
    0 => 'Don',
    1 => 'From everything I've seen, it's more show than contents.',
  ),
  10 =>
  array (
    0 => 'Art',
    1 => 'Oh... it's going to be a most interesting journey.',
  ),
  11 =>
  array (
    0 => 'Don',
    1 => 'I don't mind show, I'm an artist myself.',
  ),
)

[Art]

Came across an article / interview with Luis Arana and his Robots Without Borders "Non-profit" organization of which he is the CFO and A.I. Senior Engineer. His company promotes the use of robotics and A.I. to help solve world hunger and other socioeconomic problems that exist. He lists a very long and impressive group of companies for which he served as web designer, consultant, programmer, etc. Most of these companies you would recognize by their name alone and are pretty top notch.
In the interview he also states that any contributor would be placed on the list for any beta testing that might occur. Later, he also states that he is homeless in Brooklyn, NY.

I don't quite get how some can achieve fame and money over the years yet something as simple as saving and investing some of that money is as foreign as a microbe on a distant planet!

Not meaning to degrade Luis for I have also lost everything in my life and had to start over. While there is no shame in that, it is devastating but not insurmountable unless one lets it be. I do wish him much luck and hope that some of his A.I. experiments are more real than gleaned from a chatbot site and a webpage.

[Don Patrick]

I believe I read that being homeless was a choice. Without funding or profit, the money has got to come from somewhere, and living in a tent saves a lot of money.

[Art]

True, but it does little to nothing in the way of promoting one's presence or one's product, whether real or imagined.

Life, is all about choices.

[Art]

In an effort to continue this topic, I noticed Luis has posted an updated version of his bot, LUNA. He claims it is contained in less than 1 GB of ram (which is a fair amount of info for a bot at any rate). Luna does seem to have a fairly nice routine for searching and obtaining "her" answers.

While I found the avatar nicely human, it would have such a better effect if it could actually be lip-synced to the speech. Yes, I know that would be a tall order but life is about speculation and choices. My take. Personally, I like Luna! 

[bijit]

how can i talk with luna

[Art]

Welcome bijit.

At the moment you can't chat with Luna. Luis doesn't seem to have an online site nor a downloadable version of Luna.
The best you can do at the present is to do a search on YouTube and view the various videos of "her". Here are a few I found: